Stop the hunger pangs
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Are hunger and starvation acceptable any longer? Despite the campaign for the Right to Food Act which pinpoints several criteria as basic needs, poverty is widespread. A severe moral deficit is an underlying factor, says PRAHALAD SINGH
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PHOTO: ANU PUSHKARNA
Plea for freedom: Bonded labourers with their children.
Evidence is now mounting in many parts of our country that there continues to exist what Amartya Sen calls persistent mass hunger, especially acute malnutrition among many children. Recent reports in the media about poor children eating mud and silica to deal with their hunger in village ‘Ganne' in district Allahabad appeared in The Hindustan Times on April 4 and on BBC on May15. These reports raise, once again, serious issues of abject neglect of children and point towards a most uncaring administration.
Collapse of security
An enquiry was ordered by the Supreme Court in response to the media reports on the situation by Ms. Arundhati Dhuru and Prof. Jean Dreze, now member National Advisory Council. The main findings of the enquiry are that there is a total collapse of food security related schemes and 80 per cent of the people are deprived of their entitlements. People are living with starvation and hunger due to acute poverty. 90 per cent of the children examined suffer from severe malnutrition of Grade IV. Elected representatives and administration have failed to secure people's access to the right to food and failed to protect the life and livelihood of families in the affected villages, communities and beyond. Many of the people in Ganne village are working as bonded labourers.
The Right to Food Campaign, civil society and economists like Jean Dreze, point out several facts. The poverty estimates of about 40 per cent given by the Tendulkar Committee to determine the number of poor in our country who will receive subsidised food under the forthcoming National Food Security Act is inadequate to our current situation of hunger, starvation and malnutrition. Others that have submitted their reports in the past two years are the National Committee for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector (NCEUS) set up by the Government of India, that estimates that 77 per cent of our population have an income of less than Rs.20 per day in 2004-05; the Saxena Committee set up by the Ministry of Rural Development that says that 50 per cent of our population should be considered below the poverty line.
The Kolkata Group, an independent initiative inspired and chaired by Amartya Sen, has demanded that the Right to Food Act be made non-discriminatory and universal to cover legal food entitlements for all Indians. The Eighth Kolkata Group Workshop (February 2010), has argued for creating durable legal entitlements that guarantee the right to food for all in the country. Sen stressed the need for the firm recognition of the right to food, and comprehensive legislation to guarantee everyone the right. “A Right to Food Act covering enforceable food entitlements should be non-discriminatory and universal. Entitlements guaranteed by the Act should include food grains from the Public Distribution System (PDS), school meals, nutrition services for children below the age of six years, social security provision, and allied programmes” a statement released by the Kolkata Group said. On the basis of exceptionally high levels of under-nutrition in India, particularly among women and children, Sen has argued for the firm recognition of the right to food in general and comprehensive legislation to guarantee the entitlement of food for all. Recent experience (including Supreme Court orders on the right to food as well as the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act) shows the value of putting economic and social rights in a legal framework.
The paucity of resources can no longer be an excuse for keeping our people hungry. It is more a case of having the right priorities, and a moral deficit. The NCEUS report appointed by the government points out that the safety net can be provided within the available resources and capacity of the government. If a universal subsidy can work in Tamil Nadu state and PDS can work in Kerela state why can't it be made to work elsewhere?
Change in perceptions
A shift needs to happen towards enforceable rights, towards implementation through authentic participatory development, from target group handouts towards empowerment and agency of the poor, socially excluded and the deprived; their capacity building, participation and change in their understanding of interlinking dimension and the need to self mobilize for peaceful public action and more genuine democracy. Amartya Sen advocates economic growth as a means FOR human development, building capabilities and entitlements. Sen is celebrated in India yet his advice goes unheeded.
It is not simply an issue of the need for mobilising economic and other resources but it is more the need to mobilise shame. It is not just a question of balancing the budget and improving fiscal deficit but to recognise the appalling rate of social conscience deficit. A poor family watching helplessly as their child afflicted with starvation not only undergoes physical and mental suffering but also suffers shame, loss of dignity, hope, voice and stake in the system. Such alienation can be traumatic and can sow the seeds of social discord, extremism and upheaval as has happened among the tribals, where malnutrition is highest in the country (up to 90 per cent). By the same token the uncaring society and government suffers an equal loss of their true and higher self, compassion and humanity.
PHOTO: V.V. KRISHNAN
Vulnerable : Adivasis and Dalits demand action.
India wants to reach the moon but the question is whether it can reach its own starving children. Who cares if the Commonwealth of the “Games” is so uncommonly unequal. According to Harsh Mander, a Food Commissioner appointed by the Supreme Court, about ten homeless die every day in Delhi. Says Mander “That so many people die each day at our doorstep, close to the centers of power, is a reminder how scarce is compassion in our public life.”
Where billionaires are doubling every two years and many more have illegally stacked $1446 billion in Swiss Banks, according to the Swiss Banker's Association Report. In a ‘poor' country such as ours, how do you calculate the price of a starving child's life? Gandhiji said that when in doubt, think of the poorest and the weakest; as to how your decision is going to affect or help them. As our leaders calculate the cost and benefit of millions of rupees against the millions starving, and so many infants dying, are they thinking of the marginalised and the most vulnerable; the hungry and starving poor children, living and dying on mud and silica?
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